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Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Hunan Scandal Records from the Changning Orphanage

We have come in possession of two logs that originated from the Changning orphanage, and which were part of the Qidong Police Bureau's investigation of the Changning trafficking cases from 2003 and 2005. The first log, which we will call the "trafficking" log since it has an almost complete listing of the finders that brought the children to the Changning orphanage, covers between January 2002 and July 2003, and contains records of 222 children. This log terminates in mid-2003 when the Changning came under investigation for trafficking in August 2003.

The second log, which we will call the Changning "adoption" logs (because it has an almost complete listing of the adoption destination of each child), contains information on 244 children. It covers the period of August 2002 through October 2005. Nineteen children are common to both logs.

The second set of logs, covering the period of August 2002 through October 2005. As outlined above, this list contains 244 names, and seems to have been used for adoption purposes. Nineteen of the forty-nine named children on the "trafficking" logs also appear on the adoption logs below. In many cases the birth and finding dates are different on the two logs. For example, Ning Yu Bo is recorded as having been brought to the orphanage on October 17, 2002, with an assigned birth date of October 14, 2002 on the "trafficking" log (page 105, record 2036), while she is listed as having arrived at the orphanage on October 18, 2002 with an assigned birth date of October 16, 2002 on the "adoption" log (page 60, record 183). A similar discrepancy is seen in the dates for Ning Yu Die, who is listed with a birth date of October 13, 2002 and a finding date of October 18, 2002 on the "trafficking" log (p. 105, record 2042), but which were changes to October 17, 2002 and October 20, 2002 on the "adoption" log (p. 59, record 177). Twelve of the nineteen girls (63%) had their birth date, finding date, or both dates changed prior to adoption, most by a day or two, but one by almost two weeks. We go into the reason for these date changes on our subscription blog analysis of these logs.

The Duan family, the traffickers at the center of the Hunan scandal, are listed as bringing seventy distinct children into the Changning orphanage, but their total numbers are much higher given that most of the children on the "adoption" logs do not have the original finders listed.

Interested Changning families are welcome to contact us to determine if your child's name appears on the logs, and you would like to obtain copies for your records.

I've been told in China that in recent years (?) US government regulations require that a name of a "finder" be listed for a child to be adopted internationally and that in many cases, when the orphanage doesn't really know (??), someone's name is just put down to meet that requirement so the child can be internationally adopted. (I know of an older child adopted in the mid-90's who has no finder listed in her orphanage file, so guess this was before any such regulation...??) Can you clarify the issue of "finders" from your perspective and comment on their reliability over the years? Thanks!

That might be the case, as it seems odd that so many orphanages would make up the information if it was not required. I am not sure it is a U.S. requirement though, but may be part of the police paperwork that is needed to put together the dossier for the CCAA. In other words, it might be locally required, since even now many orphanages do not list finders.

The third date column (to the right of the assigned caregiver column) is identified as the date the paperwork was submitted for adoption to the CCAA. The next column is the date the adoption was completed.

I'm trying to understand your records. While a lot of the kids have international adoption destinations listed, even more do not. Were those kids also adopted internationally? If not, what became of them?

The second list, the "Adoption Logs", almost all have destination countries listed. The last page of that log, beginning with page 73, does not. Although these children were adopted internationally (all had finding ads published for IA), the orphanage did not list their destination country.

Brian,Any idea why many of the kids in the "adoption" log have no finding location or finding person noted? I am curious because, at least in the case of my daughter, we were given that information by the orphanage. Art

It is unknown why each log contains largely dissimilar information, and why it was not all put on one log. It would be great to see the children's names on the "trafficking" log, but you are right, many families do have the finder in their child's paperwork. The next logs (from Hengdong) do not suffer from those issues.

Are these names listed on the internet other places? I always enjoy reading your blog and respect your work but have some concerns about listing names of children. These children should have some privacy. Can you address this? Thanks

No, there is no other place to find the lists. I struggled with the privacy issue, but felt that the right of the children to eventually look up this information overrode the question of personal privacy. The fact is that unless the information is made public, most adoptees will never be able to locate it.

Thanks for your hard work.Of course, it is interesting to understand what happened between 2000 to 2005 period of time.

But more importantly (that is my opinion) could you tell us what is occuring now in China? What is the situation re:traffics? The number of NSN children has dramatically fallen in 3 yers time.What is your analysis of the situation NOW?Is choosing the NSN line a 'safe' route now?

A couple of years ago, your advice was to "go for SN" - the ethical program, as to you. But now, you seem to have changed your mind saying in one of your comment that SN line is now even worse than what used to be the NSN.

The situation has not improved in China. Baby-buying is rampant in orphanages, and although the NUMBER of NSN children has fallen, the PERCENTAGE of children that come through incentive programs has not. Most of the NSN (and many Special Needs) children come from orphanages that use incentive programs to obtain children.

you said: (...) although the NUMBER of NSN children has fallen, the PERCENTAGE of children that come through incentive programs has not. (...) many Special Needs children come from orphanages that use incentive programs to obtain children (...)

We are doing a Province-by-Province analysis, delving into each orphanage on our subscription blog. But as an example, if we look at the top eight adopting orphanages in Jiangxi Province (Fuzhou, Fengcheng, Poyang, Shangrao-Ling, Tonggu, Wanzai, Yifeng, Yugan), all of whom have probable incentive programs, we see that they submitted 37.4% of the children from Jiangxi Province in 2005. That number ROSE to 45% in 2009. The increase is simply a function of the overall decline in abandonments across China, and the fact that orphanages with incentive programs buck that trend, gaining a bigger percent of the overall pie.

Brian,I am curious, my daughter's name is the first one on the trafficking log, but there is possibly another child with the same name but found 1 month later with a birthdate that is about 3 months later than my daughter. The second Ning Xiao Hua does not have much information but the care giver is the same.I have actually met the caregiver and she did say she was also the one who found my daughter at the hospital.Any ideas why this is the only name listed twice?Thanks.Karen

As you probably know, the character "Hua" in the two names is different, so your daughter is not listed twice. The finder is listed twice, and both times was given the child she found to care for. This is consistent with the Changning orphanage's policy to "reward" finders by paying them also care for the children they found.

Wow. What a huge invasion of privacy. You say you struggled with this, but you made a decision for a lot of people. What if some of these children listed, are listed in error? I would think that there has to be a more private way to handle this than to post it for the world to see. If you have all of this information, then where these children ended up could also be traced. What a terrible way for a family to find this out. You never know how someone will react to this sort of news...very sad.

I, of course, disagree. The fact is that this is no invasion of privacy. This is allowing families, and more specifically the children involved, an avenue to obtain the truth of their origins. By publishing the lists, I am allowing those that want to know the ability to learn more.

Brian:On the adoption logs, it is unclear what all the colums are particularly the last 4 and 5 columns from the right. In some they appear to indicate a place but may have what looks to be a name in the last 5th column (counting from right to left). In the 4th from right, that clearly looks like a name.ingrid